WAR is
an intensely partisan affair. So, Press freedoms and code of ethics do
not exist, as we define it elsewhere, in reporting war and war-like conflicts.

As a cardinal principle, it is often said that
fact is sacred while comment is free. In a war, you are not allowed to
report most of the facts and are not free to comment on many of the actions
of your own country, whatever be level of press freedoms exist in your country.
The situation will be better if your country is neutral or is only marginally
involved.

Facts:
Yet, news organisations will have to respect facts, if it is to maintain
any semblance of credibility. It will be the duty of the journalist to
report facts about the conflict even if his country is at war. However,
facts would be hard to come by. It would be very difficult to confirm many
events, especially if one is under pressure to report every hour or two
for a 24-hour channel.

But it could always be possible to avoid misreporting
like the one made by the CNN, BBC, AP and others while reporting on paratroopers
landing at an airstrip at Harir in Northern Iraq. They reported that the
American forces seized the airport. However, the airstrip, which was not
even an operating airport, was not in the Iraqi hands, but under the control
of the Kurdistan Democratic party. There were also other instances like this
during the reporting of the Iraq war.

Media Manipulation
Both sides in the war have been manipulating the media amply by their
denials. This is a tricky situation. Doubts can be cast on an initial factual
report by such denials and these had been used to a great effect during
the Iraq war. Reporters covering the two developments from two ends would
not be able to properly qualify their report or assert any facts.

Under such circumstances, it is the editors who
can at least make some judgments about the relative merit of each of the
assertions. They can qualify the reports accordingly. When this is not possible,
they can indirectly add weight by controlling time or space allocated for
each version. However, this is fraught with the danger as misjudgment
is possible. There may even be criticism that the coverage is not balanced.
But, if he does not do this, the manipulator will have the last laugh.

Comment:
When it to comes to comments about conflict situations, problems multiply.
You can make a good commentary only if you have your facts right. (Mentioning
your source for your facts can save your face to some extend when your
analysis based on wrong facts turns out to be wrong.) If one's country
is at war, it would not possible for one to sound unpatriotic. So, you have
to restrain your comments. However, if the country's leaders are
taking the country in the wrong direction, patriotism demands that you
speak out. Truth is not unpatriotic.

"How is it going to be possible ever to
explain what this is really like? All you can say is, this happened, that
happened, he did this, and she did that."

Martha Gelhorn

"The principles of reporting are put to a severe test when your nation
goes to war. To whom are you true? To the principles of abstract truth,
or to those running the war machine; to a frightened or perhaps belligerent
population, to the decisions of the elected representatives in a democracy,
to the exclusion of the dissenting minorities, to the young men and women
who have agreed to put their lives at risk on the front- line? Or are you
true to a wider principle of reasoning and questioning, asking why they
must face this risk. Let me put the question with stark simplicity: When
does a reporter sacrifice the principle of the whole truth to the need to
win the war?

"Fortunately such all consuming and threatening war has
not been my experience, but this century, our modern 20th century, shows
that such wars are not an ancient threat."

The Iraq war
saw a curious kind of qualification of reports by the BBC. The anchor often
said that the reports from its Baghdad correspondent were being monitored
by the Iraqi authorities (as if the other side does not monitor broadcasts).
It is a well known fact that correspondents reporting war from a country
under a dictator would face direct or indirect threats. In other cases,
the monitoring shows up only when you are denied your accreditation to report
from the New York Stock Exchange or when the embedded report is told not
to report something “for operational reasons”. Embedding of correspondents
often means that they are nothing but glorified public relations officers
for the army. The army can easily take them for a ride, if they refuse to.
In Iraq, on the other hand, mentors often travelled with reporters to keep
an eye on their reportage.